Terry Nichols

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT TERRY NICHOLS - PAGE 4

Terry Nichols' attorneys wound up their case Thursday in Denver with mostly unemotional testimony from his wife, who failed to provide him with an alibi for the critical day before the Oklahoma City bombing. The defense rested without calling Nichols. Marife Nichols filled in some crucial gaps in Nichols' whereabouts in the week before the blast. But she couldn't say with certainty where he was on April 18, 1995, when prosecutors say he and Timothy McVeigh built the bomb that exploded the following day. The defense says Nichols was at an auction that day. During McVeigh's trial, prosecutors called 137 witnesses in 18 days, and the defense rested after 25 witnesses testified in 3 1/2 days.

A judge on Friday rejected Terry Nichols' request to move his trial for the Oklahoma City bombing, saying an impartial jury could be found in Denver, where Nichols' co-defendant was convicted and sentenced to death. Nichols' attorneys had suggested San Francisco for the trial, scheduled to begin Sept. 29, contending media coverage of Timothy McVeigh's trial precluded finding an unbiased jury in Denver. "The argument is contrary to the court's experience in jury selection in the trial of Mr. McVeigh," U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch wrote.

An FBI spokesman said a letter from Terry Nichols, convicted for his role in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, will not lead to a new investigation of the blast. Nichols wrote a letter from prison to a woman who lost two grandchildren in the bombing and accused a man never charged in the attack of providing some of the explosives used to bring down the Murrah Federal Building a decade ago. But the FBI said there is no indication that the man accused by Nichols provided explosives to Nichols and Timothy McVeigh; McVeigh was executed in 2001 for his role in the bombing.

It was the best news possible for the families and friends of the 168 people killed in the Oklahoma City bombing: a guilty verdict. A jury convicted Timothy J. McVeigh, a 29-year-old Persian Gulf war veteran, of planning and carrying out the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. The same jury that convicted McVeigh was to spend the rest of last week and early this week hearing testimony in the sentencing phase of the trial. McVeigh's conviction makes him eligible for the death penalty.

The prosecutor whose closing argument helped persuade a Denver jury to convict Timothy McVeigh in the Oklahoma City bombing will head the prosecution team for the second suspect, Terry Nichols. It was 46-year-old Larry Mackey, a federal prosecutor since 1980, who used McVeigh's words against him when he told the jury May 29 that the 168 people killed in the blast were not "tyrants whose blood had to be spilled to preserve liberty." Nichols, 41, faces murder and conspiracy charges and is expected to be tried this year, although no date has been set. In announcing Mackey's appointment Thursday, Atty.

A former Army friend of bombing suspect Timothy McVeigh is expected to testify that McVeigh chose the Oklahoma City federal building because it was an "easy" target, Newsweek reported. Michael Fortier, who pleaded guilty to knowing about the bombing plot, will say McVeigh meticulously mapped the attack and considered the building an easy target because it is near Interstate Highway 235, the magazine said, citing sources close to the case. McVeigh and Terry Nichols are charged with murder and conspiracy in the April 19, 1995, bombing that killed 168 people and injured more than 500. If convicted, they face the death penalty.

Terry Nichols should be given a short prison sentence for the Oklahoma City bombing because he's not a threat to society, a defense psychiatrist said in a letter to the court. Nichols, 43, was convicted in December of conspiracy and involuntary manslaughter in the April 19, 1995, bombing that killed 168 people. The letter from Dr. James S. Gordon of Georgetown University's medical school was presented Tuesday in Denver to U.S. District Judge Richard P. Matsch by Nichols' lawyers.

Michael Fortier, the prosecution's star witness in the Oklahoma City bombing trials, is scheduled to be released from federal prison Friday, victims' relatives said. The Federal Bureau of Prisons has notified family members of several bombing victims of Fortier's impending release, the relatives said Tuesday. He still must serve 3 years of supervised release. Fortier, who served in the Army with bombing conspirators Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for knowing about the bomb plot and not telling authorities.

The Justice Department plans to make $200,000 available so the survivors and families of the victims of the Oklahoma City bombing can attend the trial of the suspects in Denver, Atty. Gen. Janet Reno said Tuesday. "We want to be sure that victims can exercise their right to attend court proceedings," she said in a statement, adding that the money would be used to augment a travel fund being announced by Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating. A federal judge has ruled that the trial of bombing suspects Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols must be moved to Denver because a fair hearing was impossible in Oklahoma.

A state district judge Monday disqualified the Oklahoma City prosecutor who has pursued a capital murder case against convicted federal building bomber Terry Nichols, ruling the prosecutor was too involved emotionally in the 1995 blast. Judge Ray Dean Linder ruled in favor of a motion from defense lawyers claiming District Atty. Bob Macy had a conflict of interest because of an emotional response to the blast that killed 168, some of whom he knew. They argued it could prevent Nichols, already convicted in federal court, from getting a fair trial in state court.